New Mexico Tech President Lopez Comments on RPSEA Report

SOCORRO, N.M., Jan. 17, 2007 – New Mexico Tech President Daniel H. López has issued the following public comment in response to the release of a 38-page report, titled “The RPSEA Rip-Off,” which was published by the Public Citizen’s Congress Watch Program in Washington, D.C.:

“I have reviewed this report concerning the Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA) and have found it to be blatantly slanted with the obvious purpose of discrediting this non-profit corporation which was formed five years ago by a consortium of U.S. research universities, including New Mexico Tech, as well as major energy service companies, and independent research organizations,” said New Mexico Tech President Daniel H. López.

New Mexico Tech President López currently serves as chairman of the RPSEA Board of Directors.

“The findings presented as factual in this report are at best inaccurate, and, as far as I can tell, are based solely on a campaign of misinformation,” the Tech President added. “I’ve been the chairman of this organization since its inception, and I can state unequivocally that the information as presented in this report does not at all reflect the history associated with RPSEA.

“In fact, the report issued today fails to mention or even acknowledge that this multi-institutional, multi-interdisciplinary effort has grown out of the desire to free our nation from its dependence on foreign sources of energy,” López stated. “The research which will be mounted toward this aim and legislation that supports this type of research is exactly the type of efforts that the Public Citizen group should be supporting rather than working to discredit.”